This invention relates generally to a multifunctional printing machine with a plurality of services and a user interface including pathways, which multifunctional printing machine is disposable in one of the pathways, and more particularly to a fault management system which handles faults in the multifunctional printing machine as a function of either the service or pathway in which the multifunctional printing system is disposed.
It is known that a conventional copier, with its attendant hardware, may be subject to a system fault impacting the operation thereof. A system fault may include, among other things, a jam in a paper path or a disabled component (e.g. an empty toner housing). The fault condition may result in immediate shutdown of the copier, depending on the severity of the fault. That is, as disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. A-4,745,602 to Morrell, a system fault for a printer may be viewed as xe2x80x9cfatalxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cnonfatalxe2x80x9d. As further disclosed, a fault light illuminates when an error occurs, and an error code is displayed. When a fatal error occurs, all functions within the printer are stopped until the fault is cleared. A method and operation for recording and diagnosing faults in a digital copier is further disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,200,958 to Hamilton et al.
It is also known that digital copiers, which typically use a significant amount of software in operation thereof, may be subject to object faults. Software object faults may occur to result in such faults as illegal job parameters, corrupted data, resource problems, input master errors, font problems, etc. Mechanisms for managing such faults are an integral and necessary component of a printing system because such faults will often result in the interruption of the system, and possibly a crash of the system requiring that the system be rebooted. U.S. Pat. No. 175,735 to Dahlby et al. discloses a system in which the occurrence of software object faults in a job are monitored so that, when such faults are identified, an operator is informed of such software object faults prior to processing of the object. The system is provided with the means to process another object without operator intervention prior to correction of the faulted object, and to proceed with processing the faulted object after correction of the fault.
In a digital copier known as the DocuTech Production Publisher (Model 135) (xe2x80x9cDocuTechxe2x80x9d is a registered trademark of Xerox Corporation), a user interface is provided with icons, namely a scanner icon, and controller icon and a printer icon, to provide coded information regarding the status of a corresponding service or subsystem. In one example, when a fault occurs at a scanner, the scanner icon is configured in such a manner that a machine operator is directed to a fault clearance screen for further fault related information with respect to the scanner. It should be recognized that the DocuTech Production Publisher is based on a multi-tasking model (See U.S. Pat. No. 170,340 to Prokop et al.) in which a job may be scanned into one part of mass memory while a second job is being printed from another part of mass memory. Thus a scan or copy job can be captured for future printing irrespective of the status of the printer.
In the area of digital copying, there is a growth in demand for what is commonly referred to as xe2x80x9cmultifunctionalityxe2x80x9d. As illustrated by U.S. Pat. No. 957,071 to Jones, a multifunctional digital copier can assume the form of an arrangement in which a single print engine (e.g. xerographic or thermal ink jet print engine) is coupled with a plurality of different image input devices (or services), with such devices being adapted to produce image related information for use by the printer. The xe2x80x2071 Patent discloses that the image related information, in one example, could have its origin in video facsimile signals, microfilm, data processing information, light scanning platens for full size documents, aperture cards and microfiche. The following patents also relate to the area of multifunctional digital copying: U.S. Pat. No. 821,107 to Naito et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 021,892 to Kata et al., U.S. Pat. No. 175,633 to Saito et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 223,948 Sakurai et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 276,799 to Rivshin; and U.S. Pat. No. 307,458 to Freiburg et al.
It should be recognized that the degree to which a multifunctional digital copier can use its various services may be constrained in a degraded or xe2x80x9climpxe2x80x9d mode so that only certain types of jobs are processable. For instance in one form of xe2x80x9cgraceful degradationxe2x80x9d print and/or fax receive jobs can be processed notwithstanding the existence of an offline scanner.
It is understood, by those skilled in the art, that the DocuTech Production Publisher is intended for use in a xe2x80x9cprint shopxe2x80x9d environment where jobs are often captured for future printing. Accordingly copy jobs can be processed at the scanner notwithstanding a fault in the printer. It is also understood that this same sort of functionality can be achieved with a distributed copying system of the type sold by Hewlett-Packard. This is not the case with an integrated multifunctional printing machines where the image data for a copy job is transmitted directly to a page buffer from the scanner for immediate consumption by the print engine. Accordingly, if the print engine of a multifunctional printing machine is faulted due to, for example, a paper jam, then the copy job cannot be executed until the fault in the print engine is cleared. On the other hand, a scan-to-file or fax send job can be processed notwithstanding the presence of a faulted printer. It would be desirable to provide a system in which fault management varies dynamically as a function of the type of job being processed.
All of the disclosures of the above-referenced patents are incorporated herein by reference.
In accordance with one aspect of the presently disclosed invention there is provided a fault management system for a printing system having a first document processing service for processing a first type of job and a second document processing service for processing a second type of job. The first document processing service includes a first set of attribute values disposed in a first user interface dialog and the second document processing service includes a second set of attribute values disposed in a second user interface dialog. Each of a first set of fault related information, a second set of fault related information, the first user interface dialog and the second user interface dialog being stored in a memory of the printing system. The fault management system includes: a user interface with a display screen upon which a selected one of the first user interface dialog and the second user interface dialog is displayable; and a system, responsive to which one of the first user interface dialog and the second user interface dialog is to be displayed on said user interface display screen, for controlling display of one or both of the first set of fault related information and second set of fault related information on the display screen, the first set of fault related information being displayed on the display screen in response to accessing the first user interface dialog in the memory, and the second set of fault related information being displayed on the display screen in response to accessing the second user interface dialog in the memory.
In accordance with another aspect of the presently disclosed invention there is provided a fault management system for a printing system having a memory for storing a first set of attribute values and a second set of attribute values wherein each of the first and second sets of attribute values is selectively accessible by a printing system user. A first set of fault related information and a second set of fault related information are stored in the memory. The fault management system includes: a user interface with a display screen upon which a selected one of the first set of attribute values and the second set of attribute values is displayable; and a system, responsive to which one of the first set of attribute values and second set of attribute values is to be displayed on said user interface display screen, for controlling display of one or both of the first set of fault related information and second set of fault related information on the display screen, the first set of fault related information being displayed on the display screen in response to accessing the first set of attribute values in the memory, and the second set of fault related information being displayed on the display screen in response to accessing the second set of attribute values in the memory.